Snapclone/windows issue

[blake_15]

I'm in the process of scripting with SSSU (and maybe RSM) to create daily snapclones of some vdisks, and I'm having an issue presenting the cloned disks.

This is the process. First, create snapclone of a vdisk from server 'A' and present cloned vdisk to server 'B', no problem. We do this step only once. After this, the cloned disk presented to server B is re-cloned daily. The same LUN address and WWN are added to the re-cloned vdisk as it had originally, and it is again presented to server B. Ideally, server B will not notice that the disk was briefly offline, and the disk will retain the same drive letter, just new data (from a windows perspective).

My problem is that after I re-clone the vdisk and present it to server B, I don't see the new data, just the original data. To see the new data, I have to reboot server B.

Anyone know why this is? Is there a way to get windows to see the re-created clone without a reboot. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Our SAN is EVA6000, presenting to Windows 2003 server as a basic disk.

Blake

[Uwe Zessin]

> Anyone know why this is?

The server did not notice that the underlying disk has changed. No operating system supports such an operation anyway, because the new disk has a (slightly) different structure.

You need to dismount the disk on the operating system before you unpresent the virtual disk. After you have presented the new virtual disk, you need to mount it, so that the server reads a fresh copy of the file system.

[Sheldon Smith]

Check the template job scripts in RSM. They will do exactly what you want.

[CA1351476]

Hi Blake,
We had a similar issue.

After months of playing around we came up with the following solution that works.

a) Make sure the windows server is not logged in which the change happens.

b) We alternate drive letters. eg one day is N:\ next day it T:\ next day its N:\ and so on.

Shahram

[Sheriff Andy]

Going along with what Sheldon said, I think that you need RSM is you are cloning in a Windows environment.